


crossing a line

by PsychoLimbo



Series: On the Peculiarity of Dib Membrane [1]
Category: Invader Zim
Genre: Alternate Universe, Badass Dib (Invader Zim), Frenemies Dib & Zim (Invader Zim), Gen, Illustrations, Light Angst, Older Dib (Invader Zim), The 'Dib has ESP' AU from my tumblr, ZADF, he fucks up in this one, hes a stupid 15 year old ok, kind of, kind of inspired by mob psycho 100, zim is 100 intelligence 0 wisdom
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-16
Updated: 2019-12-27
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:20:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,753
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21816532
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PsychoLimbo/pseuds/PsychoLimbo
Summary: Zim, in his haste to gather information on his archrival's unusual supernatural abilities, crosses an unspoken line.
Relationships: Dib & Zim (Invader Zim)
Series: On the Peculiarity of Dib Membrane [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1572016
Comments: 11
Kudos: 350





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Cross-posted from my [Tumblr!](https://hitamory.tumblr.com/)

It was supposed to be a simple test.

That’s all; a mere test of the Dib’s incredible, mysterious power which he kept hidden from his father, his peers, and every other creature on Earth’s filthy surface. And this has baffled Zim to no end-- in the Irken Armada, flaunting one’s abilities and skills is commonplace, even considered an expectation in social situations. So to Zim, the mere  _ notion _ that any creature would keep an advantage such as Dib’s hidden is utterly inconceivable.

It simply doesn’t make any sense, and the Irken is certain that the unknown extent of the Dib’s abilities would drive him mad. Thus, as Zim has always done, he threw his entire being into finding a solution, searching for any opportunity to study the Earth-smeet’s power.

Whether by shooting a spitball at the boy in class, tossing the revolting Skool-food aggressively at Dib, or even throwing rocks at him as he passed, the child managed to either dodge the randomized projectiles or redirect them too quickly for even Zim’s enhanced ocular implants to pick up on. Hell, he even  _ asked _ Dib directly if he could study his abilities and the filthy brat shrank back in horror before slamming his door shut! 

Zim convinced himself that the only way he could ‘coax’ the boy into showcasing his awe-inspiring telekinesis was by putting him in a situation he could not escape without using it. 

Creating that situation proved easier than Zim anticipated.

* * *

“It seems I’ve bested you once again, Dib-stink!” Zim crows triumphantly, baring his teeth in a savage grin, “Oh, the wonderful experiments I have planned-- perhaps I’ll send a piece of you to the Almighty Tallest as a gift,”

Pinned to the moonlit grass by all four of Zim’s gleaming PAK legs, Dib lies flat on his back, chest heaving with exhausted breaths as his hazel eyes grow wide with a terror that borders on animalistic. Zim laughs in a manic sort of way, clouds of condensation puffing into the chilly spring air as he does so. 

“N-no, no,  _ no--”  _ Dib stammers pathetically, still refusing to use his telekinesis in favor of kicking at the PAK legs that pin him down.

“Yes, yes,  _ yes!!” _ Zim howls, “Once I’m satisfied with my experiments, I’ll present you to the Tallest as a gift;  _ I’ll _ be greatly rewarded for such a gesture, and  _ you’ll _ be able to travel through space as a tool for the Irken Armada! We both get what we dream of!”

Zim is most certainly bluffing-- he has no intention of harming the Earth-smeet, he’s grown somewhat fond of the smelly little thing-- but the Dib is unaware of this, and the Irken Elite can feel the boy’s heart rate climb steadily as the seconds pass.

The 15-year-old Dib grits his teeth and writhes with renewed vigor at the thought of becoming the guinea pig for an alien race, sweat beading on his skin. As he thrashes about like a fish out of water, slushy muck splashes into the air. Some of this frigid snowmelt splashes high enough to splatter across Zim’s arm, which catches the Invader by surprise and forces an involuntarily hiss from between his teeth. In the half-second where Zim is distracted by his angrily-blistering skin, he staggers back on his faintly-glowing PAK legs, and Dib wriggles free as quickly as a snake and sprints away through the dark spruce trees surrounding them. 

With a sour pang of annoyance, Zim hisses a curse word in Irken before bolting after the human boy. 

Despite the Elite’s superior speed and agility, Dib somehow manages to swerve so wildly between the frosty trees that Zim only catches flickers of the boy’s movement every few seconds. He’s certain that Dib is using his power to give himself increased speed, and the thought of that makes Zim’s blood boil in irritation. 

Inevitably, however, Dib grows tired and sloppy with his movements, and ends up tripping with a yelp when his sneakers skid on some half-melted ice beneath a willow tree. He quickly darts to his feet and keeps running, but the fall costs him enough time for Zim to close the gap and extend a PAK leg. 

Zim feels the vibration as Dib’s ankle bangs against the cold metal, and a wicked spark of glee alights in his chest when the teenager cries out in pain and alarm and falls clumsily into the snow. 

_ I’ve got you now,  _ Zim hisses mentally,  _ You’ll have no choice but to fight back. _

Zim lets his brilliant red eyes flicker off to the right, where an old fir tree creaks in the crisp breeze. He casts a malicious glance in Dib’s direction before swiping a PAK leg off to the side and effortlessly slicing through the rotting wood. By now, Dib’s scrambled to his feet and looks up with wide eyes just in time to see the old tree bearing down on him. 

With a thrill of satisfaction, Zim watches as the Dib’s eyes light up with a faint amber glow and he throws both hands up in the direction of the falling tree. In an instant, it freezes in place, hardly six inches from the boy’s fingertips, and dry needles rain down from the branches to paint the snow a deep green. 

Had Zim been paying more attention, perhaps he’d have noticed the way Dib’s skin grows several shades paler and his eyes grow slightly unfocused. As it stands, however, the Irken Elite is too wrapped up in his success to notice such minute details. Instead, he lets out a laugh.

“ _ Finally!  _ I’ve managed to make you use your abilities!!” he exclaims, “Simply  _ incredible!” _

Dib’s throat bobs as a shudder passes through his lanky body, and steps out from the tree’s shadow before letting it crash to the ground. He opens his mouth, presumably to let Zim know that something is going terribly wrong, but before he can make a sound, the alien’s already knocking a sizable boulder into the air in Dib’s direction. 

Dib forces his aching body to obey, to force his powers to manifest once more, and they do. He redirects the boulder to the side, where it cracks loudly against a tree trunk. Icy sweat runs down his skin, chilling him to the bone, and he tries once more to tell Zim to stop.

He barely manages to stop Zim’s PAK leg as it swings towards him in a wide arc, and Zim still fails to notice the warning signs Dib shows. 

That is, right up until Dib’s eyes roll back and the teenager wordlessly collapses in a heap. 

Zim shifts his attack just in time to avoid hitting Dib with his PAK leg, and scoffs in annoyance at the boy’s state. “Unbelievable. You’d go so far as to feign unconsciousness to avoid using your abilities?  _ Pathetic.” _

However, Dib doesn’t so much as twitch at the Irken’s words. Zim lowers himself to the ground with a scowl, crossing his arms and snapping, “Get up, pig-smelly. I don’t have the patience for your childish games.”

Still, he doesn’t move. Zim pauses, cocking an eyebrow in confusion.

“Dib-stink. Get up.”

No response.

“Hey.”

Zim’s crossed arms fall to his sides. A foreboding sense of worry begins to twist and turn in his gut. 

“ _ Get up, Dib-stink.” _

The worry wraps its disgusting claws even tighter around Zim’s insides, and the Elite walks across the mud and snow to where Dib lies deathly-still on his side. He pauses next to the fallen boy for a moment before shoving him onto his back. 

Zim feels his spooch twist with a spike of horrified nausea.

Dib’s chest scarcely rises and falls, and rivulets of crimson blood drip from his nose, mouth, and ears, staining the snow below his head with the damning color. His skin, once a light tan colour, now looks pallid white not unlike that of a corpse. Zim stumbles a few steps away from Dib, before feeling adrenaline burn in his veins.

_ I’ve killed him. I’ve killed the Earth-smeet. _

_ No, I haven’t. I still have time to revive him.  _

_ I should just let the brat die; it’s not as though he’s been anything but a nuisance in my mission to destroy Earth. _

_ But… _

_ What if… _

“Ack,  _ damn it all!”  _ Zim snarls icily before extending his PAK legs once more and scooping the limp body of his greatest rival into one of them. 

Then, without a moment’s hesitation, the angry Irken Elite rockets away in the direction of the Dib’s house. 

* * *


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Was anyone gonna tell me gaz can teleport, levitate and has pyrokinesis or was i supposed to read that on the invader zim wiki myself
> 
> Yeah I know Jhonen said that Gaz doesn't have any actual superpowers or w/e but this is an au where Dib is a trash gremlin version of Shigeo Kageyama so like im gonna go off the shits feral
> 
> Also kinda unrelated??? but I was listening to [this on loop](https://youtu.be/FgPx8-EIbGs) the whole time I was writing and illustrating this chapter and tbh it hella vibes w this fic imo

At some point after scooping up Dib and bolting out of the park, Zim decides to take the human child to his base rather than the Membrane household. As always, he doesn’t pay much attention to reason and functions on instinct instead; and instinct dictates that in an emergency, Zim should retreat to his base where he feels much more in control. 

In some distant corner of his mind, he feels painfully exposed and wants to retract his PAK legs immediately, to don his disguise and slink through the slushy night streets without the fear of being noticed. The majority of his thoughts, however, are occupied with a desperate sense of urgency focused on the single point of Zim’s base. And he’s not sure why. 

This is the  _ Dib. _ The filthy earth-smeet who dares look down on Zim enough to fight him without using his powers! Zim has often found himself weighing the pros and cons of just killing the brat himself and being done with the whole situation, but he’s always laughed the thought off as nonsensical and continued to badger the child endlessly. 

He shoots silently across the road to his base with his face twisted into an irritated scowl, retracting the three of his PAK legs which aren’t holding Dib, and skidding down his icy sidewalk to halt in front of the door. He wastes no time in immediately kicking the door open and stomping inside.

“ _ GIR!!” _

“YES, SIR!!”

The little robot bounces off the couch with a goofy grin and a salute with the wrong hand, which would normally send Zim into a tangent about the importance of a proper salute, but the Irken Elite doesn’t bother this time. He shakes the melted snow off his boots and slams the door behind him. “Prepare some of that hot leaf drink. The Dib will need that pitiful herbal sustenance.”

GIR blinks his wide cyan eyes owlishly at the sight of Dib’s unconscious body grasped carefully in one of Zim’s PAK legs, then hops closer to inspect the odd scene. “Why’s he leakin’ sauce? There’s sauce all over the floor!”

“Sauce?” Zim parrots before glancing over his shoulder and wincing at the crimson droplets of blood falling from Dib’s face onto the carpet, “No, GIR, that isn’t  _ sauce! _ That’s the Dib’s… life juice.”

“Oooh, okaay!” GIR chirps, scrambling across the room into the kitchen, “I’mma clean up the life juice and make the leaf drink!”

Zim clicks his tongue in irritation. “ _ No, _ just make the leaf juice, nothing else! COMPUTER!!”

**_“What.”_ **

“See to it that the blood is cleaned from the carpet. I don’t need more stink in my base than the Dib’s presence is already creating.”

**_“As you wish, sir. But if I may offer some input--”_ **

“Make it quick! The Dib has little time!”

**_“While the Irken healing pods are unmatched by any medical technology in the known universe, they are not suited to healing human beings.”_ **

Zim lets out a noncommittal grunt as he strides across the kitchen to the elevator in the wastebasket. “Nonsense! If it’s good enough for the superior anatomy of an Irken Elite, it’s certainly enough for a lowly human smeet!”

The computer pauses as though mulling this over. It doesn’t reply until Zim re-emerges from the elevator and sweeps down the hall towards the medical bay with Dib still in tow. 

**_“I suppose you can try. But I cannot guarantee--”_ **

_ “ENOUGH!” _ Zim snaps, “The Dib will recover just fine with Irken technology! I am  _ ZIM  _ after all, I will not fail!”

The computer doesn’t offer any more input, which is fine with Zim. The less distractions there are present, the better Zim can focus on healing the human boy. 

Once in the medical bay, Zim approaches the nearest healing pod and taps a code on the number pad to open it. Hydraulics hiss with steam as the acrylic door swings open, and it hardly has a chance to open fully before Zim shoves Dib into the pod and hastily arranges his irritating gangly limbs in a way that’ll prevent them from getting caught in the door of the pod. Once Zim’s satisfied with his unconscious patient’s position, he shuts the door again and has the pod begin a general assessment of Dib’s condition.

A pink bar of light passes over Dib’s body a few times before a robotic voice announces, “ **_ASSESSMENT COMPLETE,”_ ** and the Irken Elite immediately cranes his neck to read the display.

**BRAIN TRAUMA CAUSED BY PRESSURE WITHIN THE CRANIUM. CONCERNING SYMPTOMS MAY INCLUDE, BUT ARE NOT LIMITED TO: COMA, CEREBROSPINAL FLUID LEAK, AMNESIA, LOSS OF COORDINATION, LOSS OF MOTOR SKILLS, REGRESSION OF BRAIN FUNCTION, BRAIN BLEED, STROKE, ANEURYSM, PERMANENT DAMAGE TO WHITE AND GREY MATTER OF THE CENTRAL NERVOUS SYSTEM, AND DEATH.**

**CAUSE OF INCREASED PRESSURE WITHIN THE CRANIUM: ERROR, UNRECOGNIZED SOURCE OF KINETIC ENERGY**

Zim reads the list several times over, suddenly feeling like he’s adrift in the far reaches of space with no fuel in the Voot’s tank. He stares blankly at the display, then glances up at Dib’s face, which is crusted in sluggishly-drying blood and streaks of dirt. He growls under his breath and kicks at the base of the healing pod in agitation. Then, he rapidly inputs the code to begin the healing process.

The pod hums for a few seconds, and Zim feels some of his anxiety melt away, but it returns tenfold when the pod beeps loudly and a message flashes across the display.

**_ERROR. PAK NOT DETECTED. READJUST PATIENT SO THAT PAK IS PROPERLY ALIGNED, THEN TRY AGAIN._ **

“Shit,” Zim hisses through his teeth as he repeatedly tries to activate the pod, “Shit, shit, shit,  _ shit.” _

The same error message keeps scrolling across the screen with every failed attempt, as if its only purpose is to taunt Zim, to hold success  _ just _ out of reach of him and to mock his failure. Yet Zim can’t quite shove down the feeling of self-loathing that starts to creep up his throat. He knows this is his fault. He knows that, had he not pushed the Dib to such extremes, had he simply  _ listened  _ when the boy insisted that overuse of his abilities would cause problems, then Zim wouldn’t be in this situation.

He briefly considers trying to perform surgery himself, but he takes no more than three steps in the direction of his laboratory before noticing the tools he has lining the walls of the medical bay and stopping. 

Zim paces back and forth, muttering curses under his breath. Who is he kidding, he’s no Irken medic, he’s never performed any major medical procedures before! All he knows is the adrenaline of battle, the rush of ending another creature’s life, the victorious glee that comes when he manages to wound an adversary. 

He knows violence and war, not medicine. 

And for once, that seems like a bad thing.

* * *

Dib finally gains some semblance of awareness at the same moment GIR decides to ignore the tea kettle in favor of watching cartoons. Whether it can truly be called ‘awareness’ or not, Dib isn’t sure, he just knows that he feels detached, dreamlike, weightless, and all his senses seem to be somewhat dulled. 

He thinks he’s standing in Zim’s living room, but he’s not sure if he’s dreaming or if he’s disassociating. It kind of feels like the latter. The only thing that really sparks any sense of concern in Dib’s foggy mind is the fact that GIR is looking  _ through _ him rather than  _ at _ him. 

Dib is standing directly between GIR and the TV, and from what little Dib knows about GIR, the little robot doesn’t ever let anyone stand in the way of the TV without throwing a tantrum. 

As Dib’s grip on reality slowly grows firmer, he starts putting the pieces together, making connections between his odd state and the fragmented memories of fighting Zim in the woods. Then, it hits him and he sucks in a breath he doesn’t need.

He’s astral projecting. 

Dib knows he isn’t dead, as he can feel a distinct pull in his chest towards where his physical body is, but he’s not able to return to full consciousness as his body is too damaged. 

As much as he wants to learn all he can regarding this (hopefully) temporary state of being, he feels overwhelming panic and existential dread wash over him like waves on a stormy beach. He tries to get GIR’s attention, waving his hands in the air, trying to knock things off the TV stand, and even shouting, but he can’t interact with the physical world at all. His voice is gone, he phases through physical objects, and can’t even cause the faintest breeze with his arms. 

Dib stumbles back a few steps in horror. 

He feels like he’s going to fall apart at the seams, and he wants to scream or cry or punch something, but something catches him by surprise and temporarily pulls him from his despair. The odd feeling is a hard tug at his chest, like someone grabbed him by his very soul and gave a slight yank. He blinks in surprise before walking in the direction of the tug. 

He finds himself effortlessly drifting down through the labyrinthian maze of Zim’s underground base, guided by the pull in his chest until he finds himself stepping through a wall into a vast room resembling a sci-fi rendition of a hospital emergency room. And the thing that makes him stop short, is the sight of his own limp body locked into an Irken medical pod as Zim rushes about the medical bay in a frenzied manner. 

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to understand that the usually-cocky alien invader is driving himself mad in sloppy attempts to bring Dib back to consciousness. Which is certainly unexpected, but Dib does feel a spark of gratitude alight in his chest at the sight.

_ Never thought he’d actually try to help me, but here we are. _

Zim stubs his toe on a table leg as he tries to run around it, dropping a roll of gauze and yelling Irken curses that Dib can only imagine the extent of. He lets out a silent laugh at the sight before his face falls again and he finds a place to sit against the wall of the medical bay. 

As touching as it is to see his greatest enemy trying to save his life, Dib has very, very little confidence in the alien’s medical knowledge. So for now, all he can do is wait and watch.

* * *

_ “ _ **_Hi, you’ve reached the cellphone of Dib Membrane. I’m probably busy saving the world from aliens right now, but if you leave a message I’ll get back to you!”_ **

Gaz lowers her phone from her ear and scowls at the screen before hanging up. 

It’s about midnight, which is a good hour past curfew for herself and Dib, and her brother still hasn’t returned home. Normally, this would mean close to nothing for Gaz, and she’d simply wait in bed until Dib arrived home before going to sleep and complaining in the morning about it, but she can’t shake the feeling that something’s wrong. 

She’s always been quite good at picking up on these things, and more often than not she’s managed to haul Dib’s feral ass out of whatever mess he’s made with Zim before he can get seriously hurt. So she mutters bad-naturedly under her breath, thanking whatever deity there is that their dad doesn’t ever enforce the curfew, and calls Zim’s house. 

After several rings, GIR’s high-pitched voice sails through the speaker and assaults Gaz’s ears, “ _ HELLOOOO!” _

With a deep breath, Gaz composes herself and speaks, “It’s Gaz, Dib’s sister. Where is he.”

“ _ OOOH, HE’S HERE! He’s down in the base with Master!” _

Gaz pinches the bridge of her nose and makes a mental note to kick both Dib and Zim’s asses when this is over. “What did Zim do to him this time?”

A pause, which is unusual for GIR and only serves to make Gaz’s concern spike. Then, the robot speaks in a more somber tone. “ _ I dunno, but he left sauce all over the carpets! He was sleepin’!” _

“What do you mean, ‘sauce’,” Gaz says with one eyebrow cocked, “What kind of sauce?”

_ “Master called it Life Juice! Itsa stinky red sauce!” _

Gaz’s blood runs cold. 

“R-right. And how much of this sauce was there?”

_ “Lotsa sauce! An’ he didn’t even wake up when Master an’ me were yelling!” _

Gaz’s phone falls from her fingers and bangs against the hardwood floor of her room, but she doesn’t bother to give it a second thought or even to look at it. Instead, she grabs her favorite black jacket, a wooden baseball bat she bought specifically for Zim-related tomfoolery, and her boots. She sprints down the stairs, skipping steps in her haste and bursting out the front door in the direction of Zim’s base. 

“ _ I swear to God, Zim better not have killed him.” _

* * *

About 30 minutes have passed when the base’s intruder alarm jolts Dib out of his dazed stupor, and his head snaps upright towards the red lights flashing in the rafters. Zim notices at the same time, but he hardly has a chance to react before there’s an unusual, distorted chiming sound from the floor above which travels to the current floor. The air at the entrance to the medical bay shimmers in an unearthly manner, then to both Zim and Dib’s shock, Gaz materializes from the shimmering spot. Her face is darkened in a hostile glare, her fingernails biting into the rubber grip of the baseball bat she’s holding, and she stares daggers at Zim before snapping, “ _ What did you do.” _

“Zim didn’t--”

Gaz starts approaching the wide-eyed Irken with a stiff, threatening posture, and as she does, Dib feels the temperature hike up by a noticeable amount. Sparks pop in the air around Gaz and she repeats, “ _ What. Did. You. Do.” _

The crackling of the sparks turns into a roar, and Gaz stops at the same time that tongues of flame dance around her oversized rubber boots. Zim takes a few startled steps back, then holds up his hands in what Dib recognizes as a placating gesture he himself has used when confronted by the Irken Elite. 

“I… it was a mistake. Zim made a mistake, and now I only wish to fix it.”

Gaz’s stiff posture relaxes a tiny bit, the flames dying into sparks once more. She doesn’t speak, however, and merely waits for Zim to continue. 

Zim takes a breath, then glances to the side at the pod where Dib’s unconscious body is being held. “I crossed a line.”

Gaz’s intense glare remains a short time longer, but when she’s certain that Zim is being truthful, she heaves a sigh and drops the baseball bat on the floor with a hollow thump. The sparks vanish completely with her anger. She approaches the pod calmly, pausing in front of it to stare at Dib’s body. By now, Dib has risen to his feet and made his way across the medical bay to stand beside his younger sister. Zim joins Gaz shortly afterward with a mutter of, “Irken medical equipment is… inadequate. It only works for life-forms with a PAK.”

“Good thing Dad has the right stuff for situations like this.” Gaz replies flatly.

Zim catches her drift and immediately opens the pod. “Has… has this happened to the Dib before?”

Gaz ungracefully drags Dib’s body from the pod. “He tried lifting a Ford f-250 with his powers when he was ten. That one was my fault. He got more messed up then than he is now.”

_ I forgot about that, _ Dib finds himself thinking.

Before he can reflect on that one too much, Gaz tosses Dib’s body over her shoulder like nothing more than a potato sack and slaps her other hand down on Zim’s shoulder. Dib barely has time to process this before he too smacks a hand down on Zim’s other shoulder, and the world ripples and twists around them like an ever-changing funhouse mirror. 

For a single moment, he finds himself next to Gaz and Zim in front of his house, before he feels himself flicker and his world fades to black.

* * *

The next time Dib wakes up, he’s no longer in his ethereal, invisible form. Instead, he’s in his own physical body-- which is  _ very _ sore-- and wrapped in a thick blanket on the living room couch. He blinks to clear the gunk from his eyes, taking a deep breath and immediately wincing at the migraine that throbs in the front of his skull. 

“Morning, dumbass.” Comes a blunt greeting from his right.

Dib turns his head, squinting, and makes out the back of Gaz’s head as she sits on the floor next to the couch. She doesn’t turn her head or show any indication that she’s interested in Dib’s newfound wakefulness other than the crass remark, but keeps her eyes trained on the TV. The clicking sound Dib picks up on confirms his suspicion-- Gaz is playing videogames. He rubs his eyes and sits up, which immediately brings him far too close to a disguised Zim’s very, very wide eyes. 

Dib blinks at him groggily for a few heartbeats as he tries to process why the hell Zim is in his house. In that time, Zim backs up to sit down on the couch at Dib’s feet. Hands in the pockets of the ugly pink hoodie he often wears, Zim narrows his eyes and mutters, “The Dib lives.”

“Yeah, no thanks to  _ you.”  _ Dib spits coldly, but catches himself when Zim winces at the retort, “Wait, I didn’t-”

Gaz interrupts, “I’m upset he messed you up at all, but he did try helping you after. He feels bad, so you yelling at him now is like kicking a puppy.”

“ZIM IS  _ NOT  _ A KICKED  _ PUPPY _ , HUMAN FILTH!!” Zim immediately defends, leaping to his feet and pointing dramatically at Gaz, who could not care less. 

“Mmhm.” she hums noncommittally, “How’s the migraine, Dib?”

“Migraine? Oh,” Dib sighs, “Not much worse than usual.”

At his reply, Zim flops back down on the couch and cocks an eyebrow at Dib. “What is a ‘My-Grain’?”

“The Devil himself.” Gaz says.

“Ultra Instinct Headache.” Dib replies at the same time. 

Zim looks between them blankly. Gaz doesn’t offer any more input, so Dib explains, “Because of my… powers… I have headaches all the time. Bad ones. Migraines are pretty nasty, some people even throw up or end up in the hospital because of them.”

“Ew.”

“Yeah. But I have those all the time.”

For a time, Zim merely scrutinizes Dib as though trying to solve a difficult puzzle, then glances ahead at the TV screen Gaz plays Mortal Kombat on. “Perhaps as an… apology… Zim could create a device which would help your pathetic human body harness its power with minimal drawbacks. It could assist in easing your My-Grains too, I expect.”

Dib widens his eyes. “You can  _ make _ something like that? I’ve never been able to do that--!”

“OF COURSE NOT, DIB-STINK!” Zim snaps with an arrogant grin, “You may be a powerful foe, but the Irken mind is far superior to your human brain! I will make the device, but don’t you  _ dare _ assume for one  _ second _ that I will stop my battles with you! Earth will fall to the Irken Armada, regardless of what you do!”

Dib lies back down with a tired laugh, feeling more like himself. “Wouldn’t dream of it. Thanks, Zim.”

“Bah!” Zim scoffs, turning his eyes back to the screen.

No more than a minute passes before both Zim and Dib come to the same realization and nearly launch themselves off the couch in their haste to get right up in Gaz’s face.

_ “SINCE WHEN HAVE  _ **_YOU_ ** _ HAD POWERS?!” _

The only answer they get is a good whack in the face with a couch cushion.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WOW THIS FIC WAS A TON OF FUN TO WRITE??? G ODD A M N 
> 
> Thanks for reading, and if you want more ESP Dib content, I have a whole tag's worth of ESP Dib doodles, comics, shitposts, and answered questions [on my Tumblr!](https://hitamory.tumblr.com/)

**Author's Note:**

> Zim Fucked Up: The Musical feat. A Big-Ass Tree


End file.
